46 replies to this topic

[Gas Guzzler]

Todd Lightbringer, on 02 May 2014 - 10:48 AM, said:

This is what I'm trying to get at. There's simply not enough information available. While they did a good job of highlighting the prime variants and their hard points, it could be anyone's guess as to what variants will be chosen. They may not necessarily be A and B, though one would guess as such.

Too much guess work going on regarding a package that cost a fair bit of money, and is only a month from releasing!

Right, I'm just saying if they give us all the Omni-pods then we essentially can make all the configurations so it doesn't matter which ones come from the package. It would be nice if we knew that we would get all the Omin-pods though.

[IraqiWalker]

StaggerCheck, on 02 May 2014 - 10:42 AM, said:

Before I spend any money on a Summoner, I want to know exactly which variants I'll get in the package, what the Targeting Computer will do in game and what, if any, control we will have over our armour distribution. [As far as I know, that question is still up in the air.]

I don't know anything about the targeting computer, however as far as armor goes, I believe we can modify the numbers. Can't change the type though (always FF, and it takes 7 pre-determined slots, I believe).

[CoffiNail]

IraqiWalker, on 02 May 2014 - 11:37 AM, said:

I don't know anything about the targeting computer, however as far as armor goes, I believe we can modify the numbers. Can't change the type though (always FF, and it takes 7 pre-determined slots, I believe).

This is the correct information, at least to what we currently know

[Undercover Brother]

I highly doubt THEY even know that info yet. One thing I've realized over the last 2 years is that PGI gets paid first, THEN they ATTEMPT to give you what you supposedly paid for.

I'm still waiting on community warfare, warhorns, weapons stats that make sense, maps that don't suck, a better tactical command interface, a use for a command console, and a Warhammer that they teased us with over 3 years ago.

Waiting...

Waiting...

Waiting...

[IraqiWalker]

T Decker, on 02 May 2014 - 02:14 PM, said:

I highly doubt THEY even know that info yet. One thing I've realized over the last 2 years is that PGI gets paid first, THEN they ATTEMPT to give you what you supposedly paid for.

I'm still waiting on community warfare, warhorns, weapons stats that make sense, maps that don't suck, a better tactical command interface, a use for a command console, and a Warhammer that they teased us with over 3 years ago.

Waiting...

Waiting...

Waiting...

The Warhammer wasn't MW:O that was MechWarrior 5. However, they (PGI) have mentioned before that some unseens will make a debut here, unless my memory is faulty.

[Vagabond HT]

T Decker, on 02 May 2014 - 02:14 PM, said:

and a Warhammer that they teased us with over 3 years ago.

The Warhamer will never happen because it is one of the unseen that is controlled by Harmony gold, when the MW5 trailer went that image was what made HG try and sue Smith and tinker and pgi. they have added all the unseen they can that where not used in super dimentional fortress macross (HG took macross and two other animes and combined them to make robotech). the unseens added where the battlemaster,locust,shadow hawk,thunderbolt,wolverine and the griffin.

[Grimmrog]

yes it would be rally nice, at leats you are trying to sell a product for a price without giving any information about it.

Its like: buy car for for 10.000$ giving just a picture of how it looks.

I guess, since they keep close to the lore, the variants can be taken from the battletech wiki, but thats still a bit guesing and gambling.

[Xoxim SC]

Reasonable request....... DENIED!

[ShadowWolf Kell]

Pariah Devalis, on 29 April 2014 - 08:53 PM, said:

Indeed. Up until now, all I expect is just the P, A, and B.

That's kind of how I was thinking they'd do it. I'd love the Dire Wolf C and Summoner D but A and B for most I could live with.

As for faster clan mechs, I can almost guarantee the big ones on the list are the Firemoth, ShadowCat and Executioner because they all have MASC (which is also mentioned in the FAQ.)

The ShadowCat is going to singlehandedly change the entire light/medium mech dynamic. It can do everything the Raven can do but better and can pack more firepower than a Shadow Hawk while still running around at 130kph with BAP, ECM and JJs. So no, I'm not overly worried about the Clans being screwed over. Even if the weaponry is identicle to IS weaponry, the clans are going to be in good shape. They still have some of the best meta mechs by design.

I'm hoping we can swap between slugs and cluster on the fly, which will make LBXs really fun to use.


I think come June 17th, there are going to be a massive amount of changes across the board for the core of the game, which is partly why they haven't released a lot of info. That's my guess anyway given it seems to be an industry norm and has been for years.

I don't agree with it, but just about every company I can think of all the way back to UO have done it. Some don't say anything until about a month before release (Blizzard used to be notorious for that.) More than likely, within the next 10 days or so there'll be some major announcements concerning the Clan stuff and possibly MWO as a whole.

PGI has to be very careful how they handle the Clans because it's something that'll make or break MWO. If they completely botch it, I doubt MWO will ever recover and I'm willing to bet they're very aware of that.

Edited by ShadowWolf Kell, 08 May 2014 - 02:23 AM.

[Strum Wealh]

Lagster, on 29 April 2014 - 09:07 PM, said:

I fully agree with the OP, the only reason (and I seriously mean only) I haven't dropped cash on the clans is because I don't know where the "stuck" FF and endo slots will be. Don't want to buy a promising looking ballistics chassis only to realise I can only mount AC2s because PGI decided to troll around with hardpoints, etc. They've already mentioned that they may deviate from canon crit slot allocations for balance purposes after all...

It's a pretty safe bet that the fixed ES & FF criticals (and other fixed items for OmniMechs) will be in the same locations in MWO as they are on the BattleTech record sheets - which can be looked up at sites like Solaris7.com[/irl] and [url=http://btengineer.blogspot.com/]BattleTech Engineer, among other sources.

[Pariah Devalis]

Incidentally, I have been forcing myself to use the crude Inner Sphere ERPPC as a paired set, primary weapon system the last couple days. With 20 DHS, you can actually be fairly spammy with it, despite the 15 heat per gun. Even on Tourmaline Desert 20 DHS lets you run and fire both ERPPC 3 times in a row and not quite shut down.

Due to weight and crit savings, you can expect 20 as an absolute minimum in ERPPC centric clan builds. My TW has 23, for example, and my WH 24, though with the results of the past couple days I might knock my Wolf's DHS count down to 21 or 22 for additional firepower.

I am still unsure how the Summoner is going to play out. With only around 20 tons of weapon room after the armor is corrected, I am struggling to put together a build that is heat efficient enough, has enough ammunition, and has enough guns to be worth running outside of a straight double ERPPC configuration which is, frankly, kinda boring (though probably the heavy Clan Metamech). The Nova A is essentially the same mech 20 tons lighter, then. :\

Edit:

The Nova comparison, by the way, does not surprise me. The Nova A and the Huntsman B are, IMO, better Summoners than the Summoner. No armor issues for their tonnage bracket, similar firepower (especially so in the Huntsman B ). Similar movement profile. Smaller targets.

Edit 2:

However, if the missile based Summoner variant is released, that would work. Clan missiles are so light, you could fix the armor, load it to bear with LRMs or SRMs, equip enough ammo, and cool the sucker down all in one. Have yourself a ridiculous SSRM/SRM brawler that way. Ooorrr it could turn into an oversized Quickdraw. Either way.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 08 May 2014 - 06:20 AM.

[Pariah Devalis]

Oh my. I think I did it. I think I came up with the Meta-Summoner. It requires the use of the Delta configuration's arms, however, which both have 2 energy hardpoints. I did not, in the interest of sanity and weight saving, take the targeting computer.

Fortunately, between the timeline appropriate variants, Prime, Bravo, and Delta offer the most unique hardpoint spreads. If I was a betting man I would say those are the release configurations of the mech.

Thor (Summoner) Delta Mod - Metasummoner
Clan TW
70 tons
Cost: 20,846,959 C-bills

Engine: 350 XL
Heat Sinks: 21 [42]
Gyro: Standard Gyro

Internal: Standard
Armor: 422/434 (Ferro-Fibrous)
Armor
Center Torso 78
Center Torso (rear) 10
Right Torso 50
Right Torso (rear) 10
Left Torso 50
Left Torso (rear) 10
Right Arm 44
Left Arm 44
Right Leg 50
Left Leg 50

Weapon Loc Heat
ER PPC RA 15
ER PPC LA 15
ER Medium Laser RA 5
ER Medium Laser LA 5


TL;DR?

21 DHS, jump jets, near maxed armor, 2 C-ERPPC (15 damage each, hypothetically), 2 C-ERMLas (7 damage each, hypothetically), while moving around 90 KPH.

Can still afford to shave half a ton of leg armor off, too.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 08 May 2014 - 03:01 PM.

[Dakkaface]

T Decker, on 02 May 2014 - 02:14 PM, said:

Warhammer that they teased us with over 3 years ago.

You mean the Warhammer they got sued for using? Harmony Gold has all the Macross derived mechs on complete lockdown. We will never see the Warhammer in MWO. Not unless Harmony Gold completely folds tomorrow, and maybe not even then.

IraqiWalker, on 02 May 2014 - 10:38 PM, said:

The Warhammer wasn't MW:O that was MechWarrior 5. However, they (PGI) have mentioned before that some unseens will make a debut here, unless my memory is faulty.

Yeah, we got them already. The Phoenix Pack was all the Dougram and Crusher Joe Unseen.

[S3dition]

A little over a month to go and still no firm stats on clan weapons :/

[Odanan]

Pariah Devalis, on 30 April 2014 - 09:34 AM, said:

Indeed. By and large, most Clan stock configurations are actually pretty good, but even if they are not they offer modification options for the user. Win win.

Sorry, but most (3050) Clan stock configurations are pretty bad. (specially those of the Nova)

Examples?
Mad Dog D = 24 dissipation, 2 heat (2 Gauss Rifles)
Nova Prime = 36 dissipation, 60 heat (12 ER Medium Lasers)
Nova B = 28 dissipation, 13 heat (1 ER Small Laser, 2 MGs, 1 Large Pulse Laser, 1 UCA/5)
Nova C = 28 dissipation, 6 heat (1 Small Pulse Laser, 1 Gauss Rifle, 1 SRM/4)
Nova D = 28 dissipation, 7 heat (1 LRM/20, 1 LBX/5)

The Clan technicians made a great effort to screw up the Clan tech with designs of a surat's the cleverness.

[Kageru Ikazuchi]

While I would much rather make a completely informed decision on whether or not to spend more money on the clan 'mechs, I understand why the information is not out yet ... they're still working on it.

More info would probably equal more sales, but I get the impression that they have only recently started in-house play testing, and until they complete that (and make balance adjustments to the omni pods' hardpoints, etc.), they don't want to release anything.

If they release info about something that is clearly OP (or underpowered), there will be rage ... rage about how OP/UP it wil be, rage about pay to win, rage about how PGI doesn't know what they're doing, rage when they make balance adjustments to bring it in line, rage about how the legs are too fat, etc. ... and all rage based on pure speculation (except the fat legs rage ... that's clearly appropriate ).

PGI has their design process, IGP has their sales process ... while I thoroughly disagree with the timing between the two (IGP shouldn't be trying to sell something that isn't even close to finished in the design process), I empathize with them. I want them to sell millions of clan 'mechs, bring in more players, make a better product, etc. etc., but the timing of the clan announcement and sale (before Phoenix was completely delivered, and before they had really started the design work) was exceptionally poor, in my opinion.

Edited by Kageru Ikazuchi, 08 May 2014 - 03:37 PM.

[Pariah Devalis]

Odanan, on 08 May 2014 - 03:32 PM, said:

Sorry, but most (3050) Clan stock configurations are pretty bad. (specially those of the Nova)

Examples?
Mad Dog D = 24 dissipation, 2 heat (2 Gauss Rifles)
Nova Prime = 36 dissipation, 60 heat (12 ER Medium Lasers)
Nova B = 28 dissipation, 13 heat (1 ER Small Laser, 2 MGs, 1 Large Pulse Laser, 1 UCA/5)
Nova C = 28 dissipation, 6 heat (1 Small Pulse Laser, 1 Gauss Rifle, 1 SRM/4)
Nova D = 28 dissipation, 7 heat (1 LRM/20, 1 LBX/5)

The Clan technicians made a great effort to screw up the Clan tech with designs of a surat's the cleverness.

Flipside:

Timber Wolf

Prime: Weapons designed for bracketed weapon fire with just enough heat sinks to make it work. Ammo issues were of limited concern considering their targets fell fast. Solid weapons payload for a MWO setting, though not meta. In a Stock vs Stock fight, though, this is a non-issue.

Alpha: Enough heat sinks to run, fire both ERPPC, SSRM6, and ERSLas with no heat buildup or, if I am mistaken, an incredibly slight heat build up. Weapon systems alone are vicious even in a MWO setting.

Warhawk

Alpha and Charlie are just plain solid. No ifs, ands, or buts about them. At all. Bravo is a weird loadout, but far from terrible in a stock fight.

Summoner

Prime, Bravo, and Delta are all solid designs. In MWO, they would not be oversinked. Underarmored, perhaps, but many stock IS mechs are too. Loadout wise, these three are absolutely effective.

Dire Wolf

Prime: Under-sinked, perhaps, but it is a bracketed fire mech anyways, much like the Stalker.

Alpha: Vicious, absolutely vicious. If it was not for ghost heat, the LPLas setup would be beyond good. But if this was stockwarrior online, the likelihood of ghost heat even existing would be low.

Bravo: Also A-OK.

Stormcrow?

Prime: SOLID

Alpha: A little UNDER-sinked, actually. You know what else is undersinked? Most stock mechs the IS have.

Bravo: Borderline undersinked.



Some mechs are problem mechs, like the Mad Dog or the Hellbringer. Most mechs have more extremely solid stock configurations than bad.

[IraqiWalker]

BTW, doesn't the hellbringer Prime have ECM?

[Odanan]

Pariah Devalis, on 08 May 2014 - 03:49 PM, said:

Flipside:

Timber Wolf

Timber Wolf Prime is far from being optimized.

[Pariah Devalis]

Odanan, on 08 May 2014 - 04:09 PM, said:

[/size]
Timber Wolf Prime is far from being optimized.

And... where did I say optimized? If that is the basis of the argument, I am afraid it is built off of nothing. I said, and you quoted me, "actually pretty good." Not "optimized." Compared to anything the IS has, stock on stock, the configurations are way, waaaaay better and have a sort of theme in their loadouts.

Some mechs, however, not so much. Some. Most, however, are solid. This refers to stock on stock.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 08 May 2014 - 04:24 PM.